


To those who wait, eventually

by bluespring864



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Loss of Virginity, POV Severus Snape, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-02
Updated: 2018-03-02
Packaged: 2019-03-26 05:01:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,536
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13850625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluespring864/pseuds/bluespring864
Summary: At the age of thirty-eight, Severus Snape had never been kissed.





	To those who wait, eventually

**Author's Note:**

  * For [FrancineHibiscus](https://archiveofourown.org/users/FrancineHibiscus/gifts).



> It's late where I am, but I finally finished this, so I'm posting it. This story is for FrancineHibiscus, who was kind enough to comment on every (!) last one of the 40 chapters comprising my first HP fic, right from the start. Who knows if I'd have continued posting it without you.  
> I hope you find something to like in this little story.  
> Also, a big thank you to a number of people who insisted I could pull off "sweet". So I tried here, even if a fair amont of angst and hurt crept in with it as well. Still beta-less, btw, so any mistakes are my own and may be pointed out to me in the comments :-)
> 
> I apologise for the overused trope; it is one I love to read myself. I'd also like to state for the record that I have nothing against Professor Sprout, she just turned out to be not so very nice here.
> 
> Oh, and one last thing: at the very beginning, this had the working title of "And never been kissed", until I remembered that was the title used for an incredibly wonderful fic by Caligryphy. Check it out, it's one of the best short stories I've ever read.

At the age of thirty-eight, Severus Snape had never been kissed.

Oh, he had wanted it. Had longed for it more than he cared to remember. More than he could remember, actually, years of practicing extensive Occlumency and of deliberately striving to forget having seen to that.

But whom would he have kissed? After Lily’s rejection, he hadn’t seen the point. He hadn’t felt anything for any other woman for a long time after that. Or at least not remotely enough to risk the utter humiliation of rejection again.

Later, he had pretended to share the Dark Lord’s disgust for all things carnal. It had been convenient, and had owned him badly needed respect from his soon-hated, soon-betrayed master. Now, the Dark Lord was no more.

And the fact remained: Severus Snape had never been kissed.

This morning, while leaving the staff room in a huff over a truly idiotic discussion of new ‘experimental’ methods in potions teaching, he had overheard Pomona say to Minerva, just before the door fell closed,

„God, the man needs to unwind. A good shag, that’s what he needs. Though, to be honest, where would he...“

Severus had made haste so as not to hear Minerva’s reply. For some reason, he was particularly angry that those words had been directed at her. It was all the same to him what Sprout thought, of course. Over the years, Severus – naturally thin-skinned and easily offended – had learned through painful experience not to care about what people thought of him. Minerva, well. That was a different story.

Even used as he was to suppressing emotions when they occurred – in order to later separate them from the memories that had triggered them in the first place, and then letting them go –, where his erstwhile deputy headmistress was concerned he had failed more than occasionally in doing precisely that over the course of the last year. She had hated him, just as planned. Severus, who hadn’t expected anything else from an almost stereotypically brave and straightforward Gryffindor, had been disappointed nonetheless.

And now that their roles were reversed, he the reluctant deputy to the new headmistress, she couldn’t look him in the eye. Also expected. And oh so disappointing.

If he couldn’t stop caring when she loathed him last year, it was definitely impossible to do so now that the glances that were shot his way reflected a terrible guilt. To be liberally dosed in future with pity after Pomona’s bitchy remark, Severus thought bitterly.

He was brought out of his morose thoughts rather violently when a cat shot past him at full speed, slithering a few feet on the polished stone floor of the corridor, and transforming as it did so. Minerva flailed for about a second when her boots suddenly found purchase, and Severus reached out automatically to steady her.

As soon as she wasn’t in danger of losing her balance anymore, his hands dropped away again.

Severus only now realised that they had an audience – Dylan Wyland, a tiny first-year with freakishly large brown eyes, who exclaimed,

“Wow, that is so cool!”

The boy looked up at them with those strange, bulging eyes. Before Severus could say anything to the little nuisance, Minerva had already replied,

“Thank you for that endorsement, Mr. Wyland.”

To Severus astonishment, he heard a smile in her stern voice.

The thusly addressed student looked suddenly mortified, having apparently only now realised whom he was speaking to. Without another word, the boy turned, and half-ran down the corridor.

Severus was about to call after him for it, when he felt Minerva’s hand on his arm, and stiffened.

“Och, let him, Severus.”

He was ready to start in on a mock-irritated reply (he’d never expected to miss their formerly habitual bickering so much), but when he turned and looked at her, he found Minerva’s expression wistful, sad.

“Will you stop that?” he hissed at her instead.

Minerva fairly yanked her hand away from where it had been resting on his shoulder.

“Not that, woman,” he grumbled. For a second, his reply startled her out of the expression he despised so much, but it returned immediately. Severus was tempted to look away, but knew he could not, if he wanted his next words to be believed. And he had no desire whatsoever to repeat them.

“Whatever the hell you feel guilty about, Minerva,” he started, nearly faltering at the look of shock that crossed her face, but forcing himself to continue nevertheless, “I absolve you of all of it. Now, will you stop looking at me like you have mortally wounded me?”

He watched in alarm as Minerva’s face contorted into an even more pained expression – he had always been able to count on Minerva to scorn overt emotionality as much as he did, so how was he to react to her now?

Without another word, Severus turned, and strode quickly down the corridor. If anybody had pointed out the similarities to a snotty little first-year running away on the same corridor a few minutes earlier, Severus would have skinned them alive.

He had a moment of Déjà-vu, when another cat shot past him just a few minutes later, this one silvery bright, almost blinding in its light. In a carefully neutral voice, the Patronus informed Severus that he had taken off before Minerva could tell him that his presence was needed this afternoon in an unexpected Board meeting.

For some reason, the cat didn’t dissolve after delivering its message. It strolled along beside Severus for a while, and then started to run circles around him, disappearing under his billowing robes, only to dart out again a second later. It finally vanished when a gaggle of giggling girls walking in the opposite direction pointed out the strange sight. Severus shot them a truly murderous glare, and smiled inwardly as they physically recoiled in response. The triumphant feeling only lasted for a second, though. He missed the cat – well, Minerva, he missed Minerva. But the cat had been better than nothing.

It was one of the things he had allowed himself over the years; having some kind of friendly rapport with Minerva. To be fair, he hadn’t had all that much of a choice at first. In the beginning of his reluctant teaching career, he had kept apart from everyone, except Albus. That had been unavoidable, he’d had reports to deliver, after all, and on top of that he thought he knew where he stood with the headmaster. He had been disabused of that notion quickly. One never truly knew where one stood with Albus.

Albus had been the one who _suggested_ Severus shouldn’t keep his distance with everybody. When Severus had remarked acerbically that it would only create more mistrust towards him if he tried to befriend the whole castle, Albus had laughed and told him to just pick one person for the time being. And Severus had complied. It had just not been someone Albus had expected.

At the time, Minerva, who had watched Severus exchange hexes with her little band of spoiled Gryffindor miscreants not four years before, was the last witch on staff who wanted anything to do with him. But she had a dry humour not completely unlike his own, and sometimes, despite herself, she couldn’t help but snort at his muttered comments during staff meetings.

Then, Albus had assigned her to evaluate Severus' teaching performance, and a little grey cat had sat unobtrusively in the corner of his classroom for a few lessons. To his astonishment, she hadn’t at the time berated him for treating his students too harshly; she had understood that it was necessary if he wanted to keep control of young witches and wizards who had, in some cases, known him as a student only a few years earlier.

She had taken him under her wing for a bit, and Severus had tolerated it for the sake of getting closer to her; and before Minerva really knew what was happening, a quiet familiarity had established itself between them. They talked, and bickered, and sometimes professed to be unable to stand the sight of each other; but on the whole it was the least confrontational way of fighting Severus had ever experienced.

Albus had looked on with his benevolent twinkle; but Severus had watched closely, and had felt a perhaps childish satisfaction at having startled the headmaster. He hadn’t befriended Minerva just to spite Albus, though. At that time, she had been the only one of his colleagues who had truly intrigued him. Intrigued was the word for it, yes. He had only found her beautiful later, much later, when Lily had become a sometimes-painful old wound, instead of an always-painful fresh one.

In retrospect, Severus thought that he’d made the right choice in befriending Minerva – and it was one of the few from that time he still stood behind without reserve. He had come to respect some of his other colleagues over the years, but none more than Minerva.

Oh, how he hoped she would stop tiptoeing around him now. He missed her. Missed the frank discussions, the teasing comments, the calm conviviality of an evening spent together. Missed, too, stealing glances; simply _looking at her_ as she laughed, raged, grieved, fought. _Lived_.

Severus had always been solitary and independent out of necessity rather than predilection. Despite his prickly exterior, he’d been the kind of young man who had looked for guidance, and boy, had he gotten it. So much so that he believed himself cured forever.

Still, the one thing that remained of this early unlearned tendency was his attraction to people older than he was – and, well, to one witch in particular in recent years. If only he could have her close again... Surely, he would be able to content himself with that.

But instead, Severus, weary to his bones of either appearing indifferent or defending himself, had to deal with the rest of his colleagues over the next weeks, and it wasn’t pleasant.

Sprout wasn’t letting up, he discovered quickly. On the contrary, there seemed to be an increase in off-handed remarks and insinuations about his oh-so- horribly uptight personality, remarks that morphed more and more into insulting comments about the way he had behaved during his year as headmaster.

‘Passive-aggressive’, that’s what she was, Severus decided – he had recently learned that term when trying to resolve a conflict between two of his fifth-years, and it fit. She never confronted him openly, in any case. What was worse than her indirect nagging, however, was that Pomona was rallying other colleagues to her ‘cause’. School bullies were not only found among the students, Severus thought bitterly.

He tried not to let it bother him too much; he understood perfectly that they needed some kind of revenge for the last year. As much as he had tried to protect the castle’s inhabitants during his tenure as the most-hated headmaster of Hogwarts in recent memory, his focus had been on the bigger issues. He’d had his hands full keeping the Carrows from torturing his students, but he had, at least mostly, succeeded in holding them back. However, he’d had neither the time nor the inclination to stop the little humiliations and degradations from happening – they had been necessary so as not to arouse suspicion, and they had made everyone’s daily life hell.

So there was a twisted kind of fairness to the little payback he was receiving, Severus supposed, and resolved to do nothing about it. It was only right that he would not defend himself, just as they had been unable to last year.

It bothered him, though. It bothered him immensely. Kindness in the face of adversity was not something Severus had learned in his life; therefore, having decided not to fight back, the only reaction he could strive for was no reaction at all. It made him especially uncomfortable because there were mainly two people Severus had forced himself not to react to over the years – his father, when Severus was younger, and afterwards, the Dark Lord. Everyone else he had hissed, ranted and yelled at. Few people over the years had understood that this treatment was a sign that he did not, in fact, hate them. Quite the opposite, in some cases.

Knowing he was unwanted, Severus started avoiding his colleagues – he didn’t go to the staffroom that often, anyway; now he simply stayed away completely. He did not pause to chat with any of his colleagues when he encountered them in the corridors. He refrained, as much as he was able to, from venturing opinions during staff meetings. As deputy, he had his seat at the dining table between Minerva and Filius. Apparently wanting to make up for the unpleasantness from the rest of his colleagues, the former was treating him way too kindly and carefully, though she had at least toned it down on the guilty looks; and the latter mostly ignored him, but he didn’t, as far as Severus could tell, participate actively in the general meanness towards him.

When the prank spells started, Severus couldn’t quite believe it at first, even as, deep down, he knew immediately that it couldn’t be the students. He was feared too much for that, and there was an odd kind of respect for him growing amongst all of the houses. It had mystified him at first, until he realised Potter and his gang were responsible. Severus didn’t know what the boy was telling his worshippers, but Potter sure seemed intent on transferring their admiration for the ‘Saviour’ to Severus. Unfortunately, Potter had only laughed when Severus had called him out on it. At least one student did not fear him anymore... But that was beside the point – what mattered was that Severus realised almost right away that his fellow teachers were the ones hexing him.

Over the next weeks, some of his things disappeared, buttons on his robes kept falling off, his habitual glass of milk at breakfast was suddenly spoiled, he felt ill for no apparent reason, he tended to trip over invisible obstacles in the corridors... He could have found out easily who was responsible in each case, of course, but now that he had decided to accept whatever would be thrown at him as a form of penance, he would not change his mind.

It was all so incredibly childish, Severus couldn’t however help but think one morning, as he was helped up from where he had gracelessly fallen to the floor just outside the Great Hall.

“Are you alright, professor?”

Ronald Weasley was looking at him earnestly, as if he cared about the answer; and wasn’t that a sight to behold.

“Yes, Mr. Weasley.”

Severus had planned to sneer, but his words came out weary instead. He was tired. Just so tired of it all.

The whole situation came to a head in that afternoon’s staff meeting.

As always, two of the longer tables had been pushed together. Usually, Minerva sat at one end, Severus at the other – not because of his deputy position (it would have been more logical for him to sit beside her) but because Severus liked to watch Minerva as she chaired the meeting, commanded the room. Staff meetings were different now, compared to the way Albus had conducted them – more efficient and structured, but also, somehow, more open and in-depth. People knew that they were not going to be dismissed with a twinkle when they voiced their concerns, and so they spoke up when something bothered them.

Up until now, the war that most of the teachers appeared to be waging against Severus had been toned down for staff meetings, but as Severus entered, he realised that today, his seat had been taken by the instigator herself. He didn’t even raise his eyebrows at Sprout as he rounded the table (so as to avoid having the door at his back) and picked a chair somewhere in the middle.

Minerva strode into the room a few seconds later, looking stressed. Severus took note of it with a pang to his heart. Despite her Gryffindorness, Minerva was usually able to put on a good poker face, so if she looked the way she did now, she really had to have a lot on her plate. Severus felt the sudden urge to do something, anything, to make it better.

Usually, he would already know by now what was bothering her, but his general avoidance tactic had reduced his interactions with Minerva as well – there was only so much she would speak about at breakfast or dinner, with so many ears to overhear every word, and he rarely saw her anywhere else these days.

It didn’t help that she, too, was exceedingly busy. She still taught transfiguration, in addition to her duties as headmistress, as they hadn’t found anyone else for the post. Before that cursed last year, they had met once a week alternately in his or her quarters for chess, but she hadn’t renewed the invitation after the war.

“Good evening, everybody,” Minerva said, taking her seat.

Looking up, she continued directly,

“Before we begin, Severus, I... Severus?”

She frowned and looked for him around the table. There were a few snickers from some of his colleagues, and Severus refrained only barely from rolling his eyes.

“There you are. I already feared your avoidance tactics had reached new levels and you would not show up at all anymore.”

A few more snickers, which made Minerva frown even more. Severus couldn’t fault her for it, they sounded rather more gleeful and malicious than the comment warranted.

“Anyway, what I wanted to say...”

Minerva proceeded to remind him that someone had to attend the yearly “Teaching Practices Interdisciplinary”, or “TEPID” – an international conference of European wizarding schools that, this year, would be held in Paris. Before Severus could even think about protesting against being nominated for such a task, Pomona was already cutting in.

“Hold on, Minerva, you don’t want to send Severus there, do you?”

Murmurs of assent had replaced the snickers this time, though there were a few of the latter, still, as well. Minerva’s frown grew more pronounced, if that was even possible. Severus shook his head at her, but she apparently didn’t see him from where he was sitting half-obscured by Hagrid, or, more likely, she chose to ignore him.

“Whyever not?” Minerva asked back calmly. Too calmly. Her mouth grew into an ever-thinner line and her eyes blazed as she listened to Sprout’s and Vector’s thinly veiled comments about his unsuitability for representing the school at this kind of event.

Severus watched with calm detachment as Aurora Sinistra, his fellow Slytherin, agreed tentatively, and as even the new Defence teacher, a usually reserved man whose family had fled Britain during the first war, and who had only recently returned from the United States, expressed the opinion that there might possibly be someone else more suited to the task? He also registered Hooch and Flitwick and the rest of them looking on; with at best a neutral expression on their face.

Minerva seemed ready to explode already, when, somehow, Sprout managed to imply that, just maybe, one should question Severus suitability for the deputy post and for teaching children in general.

“Enough.”

The cold fury of the word was such that Severus couldn’t keep up his comfortable detachment, which had allowed him to not let any of what was happening affect him too strongly. He realised with a start that he had distanced himself just now with the same methods he used to employ at the Dark Lord’s meetings.

Severus’ eyes, and those of everyone else at the table, he was sure of it, were riveted on Minerva, as she stood abruptly, braced herself on the table, leaned forward a little. He nearly gave a startled laugh when he recognised the technique as one he himself used routinely to intimidate wayward students.

“Enough,” she reiterated. “Severus is the deputy headmaster I chose. We have had this discussion.”

They had? Of course they must have.

Severus had been offered the position by Minerva while he was still convalescing in the hospital wing, and had tried to dissuade her, knowing it would be an unpopular move, and dreading the representative component of the function more than anything. Somehow, however, he had found himself agreeing – he could only explain it as being dazed by the fact that Minerva also informed him on the same occasion that he had been granted a full pardon for everything he had done during the war.

Meanwhile, Minerva had taken the time to glare at all of their colleagues in turn (unsurprisingly, she spared Hagrid, and Severus, in an unusual fit of fondness, resolved to buy the kind half-giant a drink sometime).

“I am disappointed in you all,” the headmistress continued. “Did you truly think I am so blind as not to see what has been going on here in recent weeks? I would have spoken up sooner, but I was giving you time to come to yer senses!”

Abruptly, Severus stood.

“Please don’t feel obliged to defend me, headmistress.”

He was hit by the full force of her glare.

“I do not feel _obliged_ , Severus!”

Her Scottish accent was surfacing more strongly, a sure sign that she was incensed. Severus was hit by the memories of innumerable Quidditch discussions, where he had delighted in coaxing the accent out. There was a sudden lump in his throat that he couldn’t account for. Knowing there was no stopping Minerva once her anger had reached this stage, he cleared his throat as unobtrusively as he could, and ventured,

“Perhaps you would consider having this discussion without me, then.”

Minerva gave him a curt nod, and he turned on his heels and strode out of the room. He could hear her loud voice drifting out into the corridor when he had only barely closed the door. It was difficult to know how to feel about that – Minerva rarely yelled, even when she was very angry indeed. It made him uncomfortable, that she would take his side so firmly.

He certainly didn’t deserve it.

Halfway down the corridor, Severus turned and shot a silencing spell on the staffroom door (it wouldn’t do for a passing student to listen in), and then made his way to his quarters, already going over the contents of his alcohol cabinet in his head.

The knock on the door came later than Severus would have expected.

He considered remaining silent; it was late enough that he might conceivably be asleep. But, after a second unanswered knock, Minerva simply started to dismantle his wards. He knew it would take her hours; but the same applied to recasting them once they were gone, so he sighed and waved his wand at the door.

It opened with rather more momentum than he would have anticipated – how much whiskey had he had? – and Minerva, taken off guard, half-stumbled into the room. She quickly righted herself and took a few measured, purposeful steps towards his armchair by the fire.

She raised her eyebrows when she took in his slightly slumped posture, the opened whiskey-bottle, his outer robe that lay crumpled on the floor next to the armchair. The stern eyebrows climbed even higher when her eyes settled on his face and took note of the scowl he had schooled it into.

“There’s nothing like defending a friend and then having to attempt a break-in into his rooms because he apparently appreciates what you did so very much that he won’t even let you in.”

“I don’t need anybody’s pity, Minerva”, Severus spat, even as something in his chest contracted painfully. The term ‘friend’ might have been applicable for a while before that cursed year, but she had never outright called him so before.

Minerva, however, only sighed in exasperation, instead of looking guilty as charged.

“And you have never had it. But, frankly, as you didn’t see fit to defend yourself... You must have known that I would not let that situation go on forever. In fact, had I realised the extent of it, I would have spoken up much sooner.”

With a wistful smile at his no doubt still incensed expression, she added,

“Kindly decide if you want to throw me out, though, because it’s my birthday today, Severus, and I wanted to have a drink with you.”

With a decisive gesture, she pushed her wand into her impeccable chignon, and placed her hands on her hips. She was so much the picture of a stern schoolmistress that Severus nearly smiled, despite the effect her words had had on him.

Her birthday... They had never progressed to a level of friendship where they would have asked each other about the date; or maybe she didn’t like to celebrate it any more than he did.

Although, he suddenly remembered that, from his third year as Potions Master onwards, Minerva had started coming round for a drink about a month into the first term of each year (except for last year, of course) – had that always been on the fourth of October? It must have been.

He looked up at her, not knowing what to say, but, after a quick glance at his face, she nodded, apparently understanding him better than he understood himself right now. There was a slight, barely noticeable twitching of her lips. Without a word, she waved her wand at the threadbare rug in front of the fireplace, and transfigured it into a comfortable-looking, plushy armchair. Against all appearances, she didn’t like straight-backed, hard chairs, Severus knew. She sat herself down demurely, but then leaned back with a contented sigh a second later, crossing one leg over the other and shooting him another look over the rim of her spectacles. This time, he did smile; just a slight upturn of the lips.

“We have been celebrating your birthday for years now, I take it?”

Minerva inclined her head.

“I don’t like to make a fuss about it. However, I don’t mind a little drink to mark the occasion.”

Severus suppressed another smile. He was secretly pleased at the slytherinly stealth and cunning she’d demonstrated by making him participate in a celebration without his knowledge.

“But from there to spending the evening with the old misanthrope of the Hogwarts dungeons...,” he ventured, just to see how she would react.

Something between anger and amusement glinted in her eyes as she replied.

“Now, don’t you start calling yourself old. Not so long ago, I was twice your age, young man.”

Severus huffed a startled laugh.

“That ceased to be true sometime in the eighties, I believe. Are you getting so old that ten years are like the blink of an eye to you now?”

With a lazy wave of his hand, he sent a whiskey tumbler over from the sideboard, filled it with a good measure, and leaned forward to hand it to her. Minerva thanked him with a small smile, but it fell away as she answered his mocking question in all earnestness.

“Now, I know that can’t be true, because the last year certainly dragged on and on...”

And there it was again. For all of five minutes, the conversation hadn’t been burdened by the war, by the things they had done. The things he had done. Severus felt his expression close off.

“Don’t-“, Minerva surprised him by saying, and he looked her in the eyes, startled by the slightly choked tone.

“Don’t you start wallowing in supposed guilt now, not after you’ve told me off for doing the same,” she continued.

His face was unwilling to relax again just yet.

“There is nothing _supposed_ about my-“

“Severus,” she interrupted him sternly, “you did what you had to do. You couldn’t tell me; I might have told others in the castle. Merlin knows I would have had trouble watching them get hurt by what you did, and watching them hate you for it, if I had known for certain that your hand was forced.”

Severus stared at her. It was not the first time he was shocked that she knew herself so well, but it astonished him anew every time. It was one of the qualities that made her dear to him – her being so introspective when most people ran around knowing nothing about themselves, about their motivations and limitations.

He choked slightly on his whiskey when she continued,

“I couldn’t say anything either, of course. Not that I didn’t want to, mind you. So I played the part I was assigned in this farce. Even if I was almost entirely sure after the first week that you were still on our side.”

“The first _week_?”

Severus winced as he heard his voice go high at the last word. Minerva had a thin smile on her lips, and there was a look in her eyes that said ‘I might be about to shock you’, so he braced himself.

“I started questioning the circumstances of Albus’ death on the very night he died.”

Now that sounded more than improbable to him.

“The night I killed him, you mean. I don’t believe you.”

Minerva frowned at him and took a large sip of her drink.

“As I said, I’d hoped to dispense with the guilt for the evening. And you can doubt it all you want, but I was grieving that night as much for you as I was for him.”

There was silence for a while, as Severus tried to make sense of it. He came up short.

“Why grieve for me?”

It irked him that he had to ask; somehow, he felt he should have known. Minerva certainly gave him a look that he had seen bestowed on many a slow-witted student.

“I grieved because of what you had to do; of how it ruined your life. I grieved because it looked very improbable that you would come out of this alive.”

“You thought me a murderer and a traitor! You must have, at least that night.”

He received another look that was almost indulgent, and then, for some unfathomable reason, Minerva seemed to blush a little. Or was it just the fire that created the impression?

“I had my doubts. Strong doubts. And even in the moments where I thought it true, I still grieved for you – do you truly think I could have stopped caring for you just like that, even if you had done something horrible?”

Severus felt decidedly off-kilter; he had never doubted that the killing of Albus Dumbledore would inspire instant hate. There was a curious kind of warmth spreading inside him at the thought that Minerva had been inclined to trust him with nothing at all to justify it, that she had _liked_ him enough to feel bad for him even if the worst had been true. Severus took a hasty gulp of whiskey to try and quench this mess of feeling inside him – and nearly spat it out at the sudden vivid memory of his father; who had always returned faithfully to the bottle when he couldn’t deal with his emotions.

Minerva was watching him curiously, clearly sensing that something was wrong, and so he blurted out the first thing he could think of that wasn’t really adding up with her explanation.

“You called me a coward.”

He was curious indeed to hear what she’d have to say about that.

“I shouldn’t have. I would have regretted it immediately if I’d had time to think, and then I definitely did, long before the battle was over. If that counts for anything.”

Severus raised his eyebrows sceptically, mockingly. Sure. She had regretted calling him a coward whilst fighting for her life and her school. That must have been foremost on her mind. The look he got from Minerva in return was truly indulgent this time, and so was her tone, when she replied.

“At one point during the fight there was a hex I thought I wouldn’t be able to dodge, and instead of seeing my life flash before my eyes or anything that dramatic, I just remembered that moment. My mind honed in on the last injustice I had committed, I believe.”

Severus moved the lines of his face into a smirk, even though he didn’t particularly feel like it.

“I was your biggest regret, then, it seems?”

Minerva shot him a look over the rim of her glasses and put an end to his awkward attempt at levity by answering,

“You could say that. For multiple reasons.”

Before he could ask her about it, she added,

“Let me state for the record that, in my opinion, you are not, nor have you ever been, a coward.”

He answered, conscious of letting himself be distracted, the word regret still floating around in his head,

“Nor have I ever been? You know that isn’t true. And don’t bother protesting, I _was_ dying that night, and slowly; I had time to regret a great deal more than you did.”

For a second, Severus thought Minerva might stay silent, a pained look settling once again on her elegant traits, but then she did ask, a bit hesitantly,

“So what was it that you...”

 _...regretted the most?_ He finished the question in his head and spoke the answer into his whiskey tumbler.

“The boy has Lily’s eyes.”

“Of course.”

Minerva sounded so sure, and resigned, that his head snapped up of its own accord.

“No.”

“No?” she echoed, confusion colouring her voice now.

“No, I did not long for Lily. Not truly. Rather more selfishly, I was reminded of the fact that I have never been kissed.”

He took no pleasure in the look of shock that crossed her face, as he used to do when he’d said something outrageous to her. He ordinarily loved putting that look on her face, but a hot wave of embarrassment had a firm grip on him, and he wanted to jump up and flee; or yell at her to react in some way other than staring at him; when he didn’t want to be seen.

At length, Minerva’s expression smoothed out and she cleared her throat.

“Are you drunk?”

Not so much that it would justify blurting out well-hidden shameful truths, Severus thought. Out loud, he said,

“Only a little.”

“So you would remember it in the morning if I kissed you now?”

“I don’t need your pity, Minerva.”

The words came out much angrier this time – quiet and cold. As much as he yelled and hissed his anger at people, he always had gone quiet when he was truly hurt.

“And you still don’t have it.”

An indefinable little smile played on her lips, but Severus was mesmerised by her eyes – they were filling with an emotion he did not dare to name. It looked like, any moment now, they would be overflowing with it.

In a fluid movement, Minerva slipped out of her armchair, and knelt in front of his. Some accursed flicker of light from the fire reflected in her spectacles, making Severus unable to see her eyes, and, in a motion he had no conscious control of whatsoever, his hands came to frame her dear face, removing the glasses gently. They floated towards the mantelpiece without him knowing whose magic was responsible for it.

She was almost at eye level with him in this position, and close, so close.

“May I kiss you, Severus?” Minerva asked quietly, and he drew a startled breath. Slowly, he lowered his head in the affirmative, and leaned forward a little; his eyes fluttering shut automatically, before he forced them open again. He couldn’t miss seeing it, if she truly would...

Her face was already moving closer, and then there was a touch against his lips, a faint brush only, but it left a burning tingle. Next, a firm press of lips, drawing away slightly, returning, moving against his.

Carefully, experimentally, his own lips moved just slightly as well and – oh – that was so much better; and when her tongue suddenly licked over his upper lip, Severus felt a rush of giddiness. Of course he knew what to do next, he had seen people do it often enough, even if he had never experienced it himself.

His lips parted to let her in. Tongues and lips moved, careful and assured in one case, tentative in the other.

Severus had stopped thinking, and it was the most wonderful thing – like casting his first spell; magic crackling in the air and shivering down his spine.

When they parted, it was with an involuntary sigh of protest on Severus part, that threatened to leave him mortified as soon as he was back to thinking clearly. Well, more clearly than right now, at least.

Minerva sat back a little.

“My knees,” she murmured, sounding apologetic and a little bit annoyed.

For a moment, Severus was yet again horribly embarrassed, this time at seeing the plush cushion in his hands that he’d wandlessly conjured from thin air; once more without even having thought about it, but when Minerva gave a delighted little laugh, the feeling disappeared.

“I should have known,” she said quietly, taking the cushion and placing it on the floor. When she leaned forward and looked up again, he asked carefully,

“Should have known what?”

Oh. That smile was new. Still acting on impulse, he traced his long fingers down her cheek, and she leaned into the touch, rather like the cat she sometimes was.

“That you would be wonderful.”

The smile lit up her eyes now, and they were riveted on him.

Severus fidgeted.

“Minerva, I don’t know what I’m doing.”

Her reply came almost instantly.

“I think you’ll find that it is rather...intuitive, Mr. Snape.”

She sounded sure of herself, even as her gaze dropped away from his face, and her tone became more distracted. Severus looked downwards just in time to see a thin, elegant finger trail over the erection distending the fabric of his trousers. A startled, shuddering moan left his throat at the feeling and the associated visual, and a few seconds later he realised with a new shock of embarrassment that he had started to pant.

He snapped his mouth shut and turned his head away from the wicked little smile Minerva sported.

A few seconds of silence, except for the blood pounding in his ears.

Then, a rather tentative,

“If you don’t want – “

“For Merlin’s sake, woman, do it again,” he snarled, sure of nothing more than the fact that he wanted, wanted...

He should have been prepared for the touch this time, but he wasn’t; couldn’t help but inhale sharply. This time, it wasn’t as light as before, and it ended in a strong, firm grip, that, even as he sighed in pleasure, somehow was more bearable, not quite as overwhelming.

Quite as suddenly as it had come, Minerva’s hand was gone, and he realised that she was getting up. _She’s leaving_ , his mind supplied irrationally, and he lifted himself from his own armchair as fast as he could.

But no, she wasn’t leaving.

She took a step forward and leaned her whole body against him. With her being almost as tall as he was, her face came to rest in the crook of his neck, and, for the first time, Severus cursed the high collar on his waistcoat. He could be feeling her lips on his skin right now. Even the thought made a shiver course through him.

Minerva’s hands had come up to his chest, her fingers already moving over buttons blindly.

“Continue,” he rasped when she paused. Apparently he had divined correctly what she wanted to hear, because the movement resumed.

When the waistcoat slid open, she lifted her head from his shoulder, her fingers already moving to the collar of his shirt. Three buttons in, they paused over the two small scar points that remained of the puncture wound from the snake. His skin was a strange mixture of oversensitive and numb at that spot, and a quiet “Ah” escaped him as her fingertips came to rest on it.

“Severus...” she murmured, sounding almost as if she needed to assure herself that he was there, that he was real.

“Yes,” he gave back; his voice dropping to a low register. He felt his throat push against her fingertips as he spoke.

“Take me to bed.”

 _Oh_.

Even as he moved towards the door, and she followed him into his bedroom, Severus thought that, surely, it was her who was taking him to bed tonight.

The prospect was a bit daunting, because, and it bore repeating, he _didn’t know what to do_ , but he would be damned if he gave her time to reconsider.

Severus waved a hand to light a minimum of candles in the bedroom, making the furniture visible in grey shapes. He stopped in front of his old four-poster, and turned quickly. His eyes, already adapting to the twilight, fell on Minerva, who had stopped a few steps into the room. He wasn’t ready to look at her face – what if he would read on it that she had changed her mind? – so his gaze focussed on her form instead.

Unlike himself, Minerva was still wearing her outer robe – he should have asked her earlier whether she wanted to discard it, but that had been the furthest thing from his mind. Severus decided to get that layer of fabric off immediately. Preventing himself from pausing and thinking too much, he left Minerva only a second to glance at the room, before he moved closer.

He lost his momentum as soon as his hands touched the fabric of her robes. He faltered, his hands at her collar, fingers sliding over the first button and coming to a halt.

“Severus?”

There was amusement in her tone, and it made his cheeks burn.

“Go ahead,” Minerva said quietly, and against his expectation it didn’t sound mocking.

So Severus concentrated on the buttons, still refusing to look up, and when the robe finally fell away to reveal an austere black dress, Minerva’s hands came up immediately to where they had left off on his shirt. Her movements were slow but methodical. Efficient. Before he knew it, the shirt was gone as well. Severus was acutely aware that Minerva was looking at his partly naked body, and it made him very uneasy.

Her hands came to rest on his chest, and the unobstructed touch made him shiver, more so than the cool air of the room did. She murmured a spell, and magical flames sprang to life in his fireplace, warming them instantly. All the while, her fingers continued their exploration – they trailed over his shoulders and towards his back, only to detour down his arms, where, any moment now... Severus tensed.

She touched the Mark slowly, in an assessing manner, both hands examining it. Severus had rarely felt so uncomfortable.

“Could you...,” Minerva started quietly, but then rephrased, “You could remove it now.”

Of course she would realise that right away. Severus sighed, his nervous anticipation most definitely ceding place to sober anger for the moment. He did not want to justify himself for this choice.

“Yes.”

She surprised him by tilting her head and looking at him, instead of asking why he hadn’t done so. Surprised him even more by asserting confidently,

“You believe you should keep the reminder.”

She shouldn’t look so sad for him, she simply shouldn’t. She shouldn’t look sad _tout court_.

“How often,” her voice had gone even more quiet, almost hesitant now (a rare occurrence, and luckily so, as it didn’t suit her), “how often do you wake with the panic of believing it is reactivating?”

Severus stared at her in shock. How could she know?

“Occasionally.”

Several times a night, occasionally. But she didn’t need to know that.

Her narrowed eyes, however, suggested that she’d realised he wasn’t telling her everything.

“A slight change?” she asked, seemingly out of nowhere.

“Hmm?”

Severus was distracted by the way her fingers kept ghosting lightly over the inside of his arm. As before, the lightest of touches appeared to be the most overwhelming – though it might also have had something to do with the fact that a touch to the Mark no longer felt any different from a touch to the surrounding skin. Even after several months of getting used to why that was, it could still make him lightheaded.

“Would you allow me to make a slight change to it?”

Minerva sounded very much as if she expected him to say no. She couldn’t know that he’d already vanished it completely, but then reversed the spell. The incredible lightness that had come with the removal of the accusing blemish on his skin had been more alarming than euphorigenic.

“Yes.”

He didn’t ask what she would do, and she didn’t tell him. Minerva masked her astonishment at his assent quickly, and then closed her eyes in concentration. A few seconds passed, before she opened them again and brought her wand in proximity of what was now, essentially, an ugly tattoo. _Nothing more._ Still, Severus flinched inwardly as the tip of the wand came close to the ink lines on his skin.

It was done in the blink of an eye. Severus felt only a faint tingle of magic, and when he looked down next, the lines were broken at one end by a... stylised sword. Minerva had beheaded the snake, the Mark now imitating reality. It was still a reminder, but more than anything a reminder that the war was over.

He looked up and nodded.

Minerva’s look said ‘you’re welcome’, but it changed to impishness in a heartbeat.

“I could, of course, add the beheader, if you so wished.”

Severus shuddered at the idea of having Neville Longbottom tattooed on his person, and shot her an answering look that made her chuckle. He smirked at that lovely sound, allowing his happiness at being with her like this to show through.

The lightness of the moment didn’t last long, however. Minerva’s expression grew suddenly serious, her eyes wide and deep.

“What is it?” Severus whispered, afraid of the answer but needing to know nonetheless.

One hand came up to the side of his face, her thumb stroking over his cheek with a gentle touch, that made a heretofore unknown feeling bubble up deep inside and flutter through his stomach.

“I believe...” Minerva whispered back just as quietly, “that I’ve grown very fond of you, Severus.”

It was too much. Severus suppressed the rather violent urge to turn away from her and get a safe distance between them, to try and reduce the feeling of being overwhelmed. It would hurt her deeply, he knew instinctively, so he limited himself to closing his eyes, and turning his head away.

“Severus?”

Why, oh why, did she have to sound so hurt by even that small gesture? This wasn’t helping him to get his bearings. So Severus, like the spy he had been, changed tactics abruptly. He couldn’t feel much more out of his depth right now; therefore... why not leave his comfort zone behind completely?

He opened his eyes, brought both of his hands to her face and kissed her like a man possessed.

Minerva stayed immobile for just a second, but then gave back as good as she got. A spell Severus often used to unfasten his myriad of buttons was on his lips as soon as he drew back for air, and the long row of buttons on the front of her dress sprung open. His hands pushed the fabric over her shoulders. From there, it slid down her arms, and he moved into another kiss.

Minerva moaned into it, and the only thought on his mind was that it was him who had provoked that sound. He felt hands on his belt, then on the buttons of his trousers, lightly brushing against the bulge tenting them, and it was his turn to moan again – loud and drawn out. Minerva’s mouth abandoned his, her lips moving to suck on his earlobe, and the moan was followed by a startled gasp.

Dimly, he noticed his trousers falling to the floor, but he was occupied with getting her brassiere off. The clasp at her back resisted his efforts stubbornly, and Severus hissed a frustrated,

“ _Divestio_.”

Focus and control were paramount in the using of wandless magic, however, as he remembered when they suddenly found themselves completely naked, all of their remaining clothes having disappeared.

Minerva laughed, and Severus would have joined in, had she not taken his cock in hand at that moment. He groaned obscenely and only barely kept his body from folding in half at the sensation that shot through him. Nothing had ever felt this intense when he had touched himself. The contact ceased after a second, which was both a relief and a disappointment.

Hands gripped his shoulders instead, and Severus felt himself being manoeuvred towards the bed.

He went willingly.

The next few minutes were a blur, as hands and lips explored his body. A spot on his hipbone was discovered, that, when caressed by Minerva’s lips, made him shiver and sigh in pleasure. Touches to his sides made him squirm, and Minerva took far too much delight in that. When a finger dipped behind his balls and between his arse cheeks, his hips came off the bed with a shout that was almost a sob, his body arching up. She changed then to soft kisses and maddeningly light strokes over his inner thighs, and then, a tongue licked over one of his nipples, then the other, and...

At length, Severus realised that he was mainly just lying there passively. He had kept his eyes closed most of the time, always anticipating but also dreading what she would do next – it was all new, all unfamiliar, all bordering on _too much_.

But now, he took a fortifying breath and opened his eyes, looked, really looked at the female form in front of him for the first time.

“May I?” he whispered.

Minerva’s eyes blinked up from under her eyelids.

“Yes, Severus” she replied in a slightly admonishing tone that made his cheeks burn. She must think him a selfish bastard, or at least a bumbling fool, and he was going to rectify that as best he could.

“Yes” she murmured again, when he reached up and let his fingers slowly trail over her pear-shaped breasts, watching in fascination as the nipples grew a shade darker.

“Lie down,” he whispered, and she complied wordlessly, but with an arch look that seemed to say ‘You’d better deliver now’. Severus gulped. How could he do anything with those eyes riveted on him?

She closed them.

For a few seconds, he just looked. At white skin, here and there traversed by bluishly visible veins. At curly, wiry hair in a vee of legs. At age lines that provided contours, texture. At a few grey strands of hair that had, by now, escaped her bun. At a vulnerably bared throat – where Severus placed his first kiss, eliciting a quiet sigh.

“Minerva.”

He whispered the name on an exhale, and moved a bit lower, kissed between her breasts, sucked on her nipples, ran his hands down her sides (she squirmed just as he had), nuzzled her stomach, touched his fingertips to the wetness of her folds.

That scent...

He drew in a deep breath of it, delighting in it, as well as in the way she writhed when he blew a hot breath over her sex. He allowed himself a taste, licking, sucking; all the while listening to her deep groans and increasingly breathy sighs.

His own arousal had become a background throb, that he managed to ignore for the most part, until Minerva whispered his name, leaned up on her elbows, looked down on him, and stated,

“I think you should fuck me now, Severus.”

Severus thought in passing that he should be grateful for the rush of nervousness that seized him at hearing those words – otherwise, he might have come on the spot. Instead, he moved upwards for a careful, closemouthed kiss, and lined himself up rather clumsily.

“Let me,” Minerva whispered, and he felt her hands on his member, bringing him into position.

He pushed just the tiniest bit, but then realised he couldn’t stop because... oh. Oh! Oh.

 _Move_. In. And out. And in...

Her hands roamed over his shoulders, down his spine, over his backside, and still, Severus moved; towards faster, shorter strokes. He barely noticed one of Minerva’s hands moving down her own body to touch her clitoris, so lost was he in the movements. But then, she clenched around him, crying out, and Severus let go – shaking, moaning, spilling his seed inside of her.

As best he could, he held himself up over her, reluctant to pull out of her warmth even as his member was softening. For the first time in his life, he had found a moment that he might have liked to prolong forever.

Finally, he slipped out, and let himself fall down onto the bed next to her.

The silence became oppressive quickly, and he said quietly to the ceiling,

“I’m sorry. I didn’t think of you when...”

“Oh hush, Severus,” she interrupted, gently admonishing, and just as gently brushing away strands of hair from his face.

“This was...”

A kiss to his cheek.

“...lovely.”

Another kiss; this one to his shoulder.

The duvet, which had lain crumpled at the foot of the bed, draped itself over them, and Severus drifted off to sleep, Minerva’s left hand still resting lightly on his right shoulder, her body still turned towards him.

He woke in pitch-black darkness.

The bed was empty, he knew, even before he lit a candle. He threw on a robe, but still he was more naked than he’d been in a very long time. Severus felt it keenly when he stood before Minerva just moments later – he wore no carefully schooled impression, no mask.

Minerva was sitting in the living room alcove window that looked out into the Great Lake, huddled up in her robes. She showed no sign of hearing him come closer until he stood in front of her. Then, she turned towards him and looked up. She was crying silently, tears nestling in the lines of her cheeks for a moment before travelling further down.

Severus felt a curious mixture of dismay, anger and self-loathing, and it must have shown, because she whispered hoarsely, urgently,

“No, Severus, it’s not you – not because of you.”

She reached out a hesitant hand towards him, and he took it in one of his, even if he didn’t know if he could believe her. Automatically, he dropped to his knees, copying her earlier gesture. The windowsill was higher than the chair had been, so he had to look up a bit.

Tears were still making their way down her cheeks.

Severus had never heard himself make such a sound as escaped him now – a low, hurt, not-quite-but-then-again-very human noise in the back of his throat. He reached up with his free hand, the other still clutching hers, and brushed a thumb over tear tracks, wiping them away carefully.

“Its just...I cry because I’m ashamed at my own happiness, I think.”

Minerva said the words quietly. Severus stilled the movement of his hand. He simply looked at her, until she elaborated.

“I woke up, and you were sleeping... so peacefully. I just looked at you for a little while, and then I thought how much I’d enjoy it when Albus would inevitably find out about us and confront us about it... And then I remembered – “

Severus felt the words hit him like a curse – had he stood, he would have stumbled backwards. There wasn’t enough air in the room all of a sudden, and he drew in a sharp, gasping breath.

Why had she not pushed him away yet? How could she not have pushed him away yet? Him – the murderer?

Inexplicably, she did the opposite, sliding to the floor beside him, gathering him in her arms. Severus allowed it, though he remained stiff, waiting for her to draw back in horror when she realised whom exactly she held so close.

“I don’t blame you, you fool.”

Her voice was still not quite steady.

“I just have trouble understanding how I can have this, when they’re all gone.”

With a sudden rush of understanding, Severus remembered the impulse to shun everything that he liked, after Lily was gone. There were certain things he had never done again.

But there had been a reason for it all, a reason for punishment – it had been his fault that she died.

Carefully, he ventured,

“Minerva. Even I, as someone who has quite possibly elevated wallowing in guilt to an art form,” and he tried a grimace that might pass for a wry smile, “even I leave it be at feeling undeserving and...”

 _...and, for the most part, accepting what life deals me_ , he wanted to say, but she interrupted him, her voice firm now.

“Undeserving, Severus? Now isn’t that quite similar to my reaction – and quite as silly?”

He wanted to protest, started saying “What I have done...,” but she interrupted again.

“When you were still in the hospital wing, a reporter – forgive me for bringing this up, Severus – a reporter asked Harry, quite insistently, how he could advocate for you, when you were responsible for his parent’s death, by passing on the prophecy.”

Oh, how it hurt to hear that said aloud, even if he thought the accusation just.              

“Harry stayed calm at first, but when the reporter didn’t give up, he finally yelled ‘it wasn’t his fucking fault!’”

Despite the seriousness of the issue, Severus noted somewhere in the back of his mind that he was quite partial to the way her Scottish brogue drew out the curse word.

“And he’s right. It wasn’t. You made mistakes, Severus, I grant you that. But you did more to make up for them than most.”

She looked so earnest, imploring him to believe her, her own pain quite forgotten by dealing with his, and at this moment, he wanted to do just that – believe her. There would be other moments where he couldn’t, though, and he said as much.

“I understand,” Minerva surprised him by replying, “but then you don’t get to berate me for feeling the same on occasion.”

 _It is decidedly_ not _the same_ , his mind screamed, but he refrained from voicing the thought for the time being. He was tired, and so was she, by the looks of it.

“All right. We should return to this topic another time, perhaps. Will you... come back to bed now?”

He faltered slightly over the question. Another first.

Minerva nodded, her eyes glinting suspiciously again, but not spilling over. They got up, and she drew him into a tight embrace for a second.

“I am glad you’re here, Severus,” she said into his robes, and Severus heard the underlying _glad that you’re alive_. He was, as well, he realised.

Yes. He was, as well.

Severus woke early, sometime before his old Muggle alarm clock would start its asthmatic rattling sound. Minerva had turned her back to him in sleep, and the first thing he saw when he opened his eyes was the loosened bun of her hair, and the tip of her bare shoulder peeking out from under the sheets.

His hands itched immediately to loosen her hair entirely, and, after a few seconds, he gave in to the impulse, lightly brushing his fingers into it until he found a hair band, which he pulled free carefully. The hair, however, remained in position.

He startled a little when Minerva suddenly murmured a spell in a hoarse voice. It made the strands of hair fall down over her neck immediately, and Severus had his hands in them again before he’d thought about it.

“Good morning, Severus.”

She sounded very much awake, but didn’t turn to face him. Severus would have expected to be out of his depth with a woman in his bed of a morning, but, somehow, with Minerva, right this instant, it felt simple and light.

“I like your hair open.”

A quiet chuckle.

“I’m realising that. I find it impractical, during the day. Don’t you?”

Now she turned around. Severus sighed at the inquiring look on her face, but smiled at a few pillow creases that had temporarily embedded themselves in her skin. He brushed his fingertips over them, and leaned forward to place a kiss on her forehead. His heart beat wildly, still not quite believing that he was allowed this. When he pulled back, she continued to look expectant for an answer, her hands coming up to tangle in his lank black strands.

“It hides my unfortunate face.”

There. He’d said it. Minerva frowned, apparently torn between seriousness and eye-rolling. Her fingertips moved from his hair to his large forehead, then to his even larger nose, and down the worry lines etched into his skin. She took the hair band that still lay on the pillow and pulled his hair back as best she was able from the awkward angle created by their lying position.

“I like it like this. And I wouldn’t say unfortunate.”

She ignored his disbelieving snort and added,

“Your face can be a bit harsh, maybe, but mostly when you make it so yourself...”

At this moment, his alarm went off.

“Merlin and Morgana, what is that?”

Severus smirked at the look of irritation that crossed her face. For good reason, he had spelled the clock to resist being magically shut off, so he had to turn and do it manually.

“It’s six o’clock.”

Within seconds, the woman in front of him became the headmistress again. She sat up, clothes already flying towards her, and began to pull them on.

“I haven’t prepared my third year lesson.”              

Oh no, that was not a good enough reason to leave.

“Minerva. You have taught for decades.”

She had the gall to look at him admonishingly as soon as her dress was on.

“I still have to spell-test the teapots.”

She was serious.

“All right, then, if you must. Teapots into tortoises? I don’t envy those third-years.”

Minerva graced him with a smirk.

“You were always hopeless at transfiguration.”

Severus felt his eyebrows go up. He took his wand, as well as the first expendable object he could reach on his bedside table – an empty potions vial – and, without much effort, transfigured it into a dragon flower. It was the most intricate and therefore difficult blossom he could think of on the spot.

“I taught myself later. A joint Gryffindor-Slytherin class might not have been the best learning environment for an unpopular Slytherin struggling with the subject.”

He held out the flower to Minerva, who took it, but with a look of such dismay at having failed a student decades ago that Severus chuckled.

“Oh, don’t blame yourself,” he murmured, and found the courage to lean in and give her a quick kiss. She returned it, still looking a bit miffed, and got up a second later, fastening the last buttons, and spelling her hair up.

A few steps from the door, she turned.

“Could we move up to my quarters for tonight? In general, I prefer not to be too far from my office in the evening, just in case.”

Severus couldn’t help but stare at her. A not insignificant part of him had been afraid, no had been _certain_ that, in the light of day, Minerva’s actions during the night would turn out to be a one-time-only act of kindness towards him, nothing more.

“Forgive me, I had simply assumed...,” he heard her say now, and realised that he should have answered immediately.

“Assume away.”

His voice came out a bit hoarse.

“I shall join you after dinner, if that is agreeable?”

A bright smile danced over Minerva’s features, making her look like a much younger woman for a moment.

“Certainly.”

With that, she turned and disappeared through the door, taking the transfigured flower with her. A few seconds later, he heard his living-room floo activate. The noise brought him out of his torpor, and he went on to perform his morning ablutions.

He frowned, slightly irritated with himself, when he caught himself humming a Weird Sisters song in the shower. He didn’t even like the band.

He ran a hand over his mark and smiled grimly, but also triumphantly, at the sight of the beheaded snake.

He threw on some clothes and accioed his robes from the living room.

When he noticed that he had put Minerva’s hair band on his wrist at some point, he shrugged, and pulled his hair back with it.

There were whispers about his appearance when he strode into the great hall, and for the first time in a very long time, maybe for the first time ever, they didn’t provoke an ambivalent or negative reaction on his part. No, they simply amused him. Greatly.

A Gryffindor fifth year, who had arrived at the school with a ponytail this year, clearly thinking himself the height of coolness, stared, and Severus didn’t suppress the urge to grin at him. The boy reared back in shock.

“In a good mood today, Severus?” Minerva asked innocently when he took his usual seat beside her.

“Are you sure you don’t know why that could be?” he replied, only just refraining from adding an exaggeratedly saccharine ‘my dear’.

Maybe it was a bit backwards to start flirting now, after a night already spent together, but that’s what they did. Rather outrageously, in fact. Severus took great pleasure in observing the expressions on his colleagues’ faces from the corners of his eyes. Pomona seemed to have lost her appetite for some reason.

“Oh, you had forgotten those.”

He pulled Minerva’s glasses from his breast pocket, letting his eyes blink up to the identical ones she was wearing just now. She smiled at him, removed them, and, with a tap of her wand, transfigured them back into a quill.

“Thank you, Severus,” she said quietly, much more seriously than the situation warranted, and took the original pair from his hands. She covered his hand with hers for a moment. At her other side, Sprout made a noise somewhere between shock and disgust, and Minerva rounded on her like a hissing cat.

“You have something to say, Pomona?”

“Minerva...” Severus tried to stop her, always weary of causing a scene. And so soon after the other one, too.

Without turning around, her hand unerringly found his, coming to rest firmly upon it. That shut him up, even if he still moved forward a little, so that he was in Pomona’s line of sight. In his peripheral vision, he noticed students looking up to the head table, some staring at him for a second before moving uncomfortably on. Clearly, they had been alerted by the headmistress’ abrupt movement. Severus was thankful for small favours when he realised none of them could see their clasped hands from the lower level they were sitting at.

Meanwhile, Sprout stared at them with hard eyes.

Finally, she said to Minerva,

“You are sure about this.”

Minerva gave a curt nod, and added, “Very sure.”

Severus would have liked to know what exactly they were discussing – their relationship, whatever form it might take, or simply her defence of him? Those two, however, had worked together long before he’d even attended Hogwarts. They weren’t friends, exactly, but there was a strange familiarity between them. He had never found a way to ask Minerva about it. It suddenly occurred to him that he probably could, now; without much ceremony. The thought pleased him enough to give the irate witch in front of them a very unwise smirk.

He saw Pomona bristle and waited for the consequences, but she shocked him by taking a deep breath and saying, almost calmly,

“Well. I shall have tea with both of you, then.”

The prospect of that situation was definitely a valiant attempt at defining his own personal kind of hell, Severus decided, but he kept his face impassive, as Minerva accepted, and fixed a day and time, sounding completely unsurprised.

He berated her for the whole thing as they crossed paths in the late afternoon, Minerva returning from her last lesson of the day, Severus heading out to the forest to gather several fungi and flowers which were in season.

“I have neither the energy nor the will to let pointless disputes go on in my school,” was the only answer Minerva gave him.

Severus looked at her sharply – only very rarely did she call Hogwarts _her_ school. He decided this was a time to accept his fate gracefully. He had experience enough with that, after all, though there had rarely been anything graceful about it.

He nodded his assent, and was flooded by a strange, giddy burst of happiness when Minerva looked around to make sure the corridor was empty of students, before placing a quick kiss on the corner of his mouth. Like a great many things that had happened recently, it was unexpected, and quite wonderful.

“See you at dinner, Severus,” she said.

Minerva wasn’t at dinner.

Minerva wasn’t at dinner, and Severus felt like fists of stone were pummelling his stomach from the inside. He saw Sprout watching him and pulled himself together, shielded his expression in a manner that he’d hoped would finally become obsolete.

A day – not even a full twenty-four hours of happiness. Severus had thrown out hope long ago, but it had a habit of stealthily sneaking back at those times when it would hurt the most to lose it again. And losing it he was, rapidly. She would have informed him if something had come up, wouldn’t she? Therefore, she was avoiding him. Therefore, she had changed her mind. Or taken a moment to realise what she was getting into with him. Which amounted to the same thing, really.

He was fully convinced he’d get hurt, but went anyway.

She hadn’t un-invited him, after all.

Minerva sat at her desk, surrounded by parchment. Her face appeared almost haggard when she looked up – a startling transformation from when he’d seen her last this afternoon.

“I am so sorry, Severus.”

There we are. He wasn’t even angry, only felt himself close off, take refuge in Occlumency.

“Now don’t look like that,” she had the gall to say, and it hurt, just as he’d thought. And such an indulgent-admonishing tone, too. There was a grim satisfaction in having been right, but it felt hollow.

“I really have to finish this parchmentwork. There are still quite a few letters from parents that need answering, and soon. I thought if I worked through dinner... but I have barely made a dent in it, as you can see. You could leave me to it, and come back later? I’m afraid it’s going to get very late, though.”

It took him a few seconds to adjust. She hadn’t been avoiding him she hadn’t changed her mind she wanted him to come back later she...

Just before she could ask if there was something wrong, he answered in his own roundabout way.

“You know I don’t sleep all that much.”

In fascination, he watched Minerva’s eyes light up. It made him feel strangely guilty for assuming what he had. She smiled broadly, when he added impulsively,

“I can take half of the letters.”

He knew he was revealing more than a little with that statement – Severus had been adamant that, as deputy, he wouldn’t deal with concerned parents (“I have neither the taste nor the talent for that sort of thing, and no one would be reassured by hearing from me anyway”). Changing his mind now conferred a certain importance to his new rapport with Minerva. But his inner logic insisted that she deserved to know a little at least of how he felt, after he had jumped to false and unjust conclusions about her behaviour. He’d been immediately sure she’d decided she was through with him, which showed less faith than she deserved.

Predictably, Minerva’s “How generous of you” sounded far too delighted for her not to have read between the lines. Severus pulled the visitors chair closer to the desk and settled on it.

They worked in interrupted silences, punctured by Severus’ acerbic comments on the definite familial resemblance of some progenitors with their dunderheaded offspring. In turns, it made Minerva stifle a smile or purse her lips.

Without comment, she suddenly shoved a pile of forms for the TEPID-conference towards him, and he sighed dramatically, before accepting his fate (“Make no mistake, Severus, you are going to that conference. There’s no getting out of it now.”)

“Have you eaten at all?” he asked some time later, halfway through the stack of letters. He frowned and put the last one he’d been looking at aside to give to Flitwick – a father did not approve of the ‘conceptualisation’ used to teach his daughter Charms theory. It never ceased to astonish him what people had the time to worry about.

“I seem to have forgotten,” Minerva had answered in the meantime, and Severus summoned a house elf. He had always been uncomfortable around them – there was something about their submissive attitude that he found revolting, even if he’d never cared to analyse why – but Deno was a case apart. The quirky little creature had been waiting for him in the Headmaster’s office on his first night in the dreaded position, telling him in an elfishly squeaky voice that he wasn’t afraid of him; his black eyes serious and very round.

“Deno,” Severus said now, and ordered sandwiches as soon as the elf had appeared with a crack. He disappeared again without having spoken a word. Severus got the distinct impression that he was sulking. Possibly because he was rarely called upon anymore.

Minerva quirked an eyebrow at him, having followed the interaction with undisguised interest.

“I employed him to help me last year. He’s a strange one; I think for him it was an adventure.”

“Help you? In what way?”

Severus sighed.

“Well, distracting the Carrows when I was trying to avoid punishing students, apparating me through the castle so I could be everywhere at once, spying for me in the common rooms – that sort of thing.”

With another cracking noise, Deno was back. He would have disappeared again without a word after depositing an overly large platter of sandwiches, but Minerva surprised Severus by stopping the elf and explaining earnestly that she had a very busy schedule this year and could use help in getting to her classes on time.

Deno beamed at them both.

“Thank you, headmistress and headmaster.”

“I am not...”

Another crack, and Severus trailed off, not seeing the point in speaking to thin air. Minerva hid a smile, and then took a sandwich, eyes already returning to her work.

“That was kind of you. And practical, too,” he said after a while.

“Don’t sound so surprised, Severus. I am trying to do this job well.”

_Not like the previous tenant of the post, who barely managed to keep his students from being tortured._

 “I never doubted it.”

He had trouble keeping the hurt out of his voice, and didn’t understand why that was. It had been years since he’d found it difficult to calculate and control his reactions.

“That was in no way a comment on your performance last year, Severus.”

A stern look over the rim of her tiny spectacles. How did she know so unerringly what he was thinking? Minerva reached out a hand to cover his where it was clenching and crumpling a piece of parchment. The touch sent a jolt through him, and that was another thing he couldn’t control and...

“Severus.”

So much worry in his name.

“Excuse me,” he chocked out. “I am unaccustomed to this.”

The word _trust_ had had no meaning in his vocabulary before Albus Dumbledore had defined it, and then barely any left after the man had taken it away from him again in the most spectacular perversion of the concept – trusting Severus with his death.

To his horror, Severus found himself uttering words to that effect, trying to explain, to justify why he was the way he was. Minerva’s hands had come up to frame his face, and Severus wished ardently that he could let his hair fall forward to hide his expression. The hair band snapped, and the accidental magic startled him. Control. He needed his control – he should leave.

Severus stood to turn, his hair finally obscuring his expression, but Minerva had other ideas. A cat jumped over the desk and retransformed before he could complete his movement, and then she drew him into an embrace that made him tense up even more than he’d done already.

In increments, Severus relaxed into the touch and the warmth of her body against his, copying her steady, calm breaths. Minerva smelled a bit like the marigold healing balm he made for the hospital wing. A calming scent.

With calmness came shame at his behaviour, at his lack of control, at being the way he was.

Severus tried to twist out of the arms that enveloped him, his face heating. Minerva didn’t stop him, only went with the movement. A second later, her arms were still around him, now coming together at his chest, and Severus felt her lean against his back, her head finding a resting place on his right shoulder.

“What do you want with me?” he whispered tonelessly. “Can’t you see that I’m...”

_Broken. Unworthy of the effort._

“Fucked up?” Minerva asked, the muscles of her jaw moving against his shoulder, and Severus drew in a sharp breath at the bluntness of the word, so strangely softened again by the round edges of her accent.

“We all are, to varying degrees. Considering what I know about your life, you appear surprisingly sane to me.”

Severus shifted uncomfortably.

“You don’t know what the inside of my head looks like.”

The reply came immediately.

“No, I don’t. But the reverse also applies, and that is just as well.”

He laughed bitterly.

“What would you have to fear?”

Minerva sounded exasperated when she replied this time, and there was a curious hint of fear in her voice, as well.

“Quite a lot. You don’t know everything about me, Severus...”

Then, abruptly, she added,

“You!”

After a startled second, he realised she was looking over his shoulder and at the painted form of Albus Dumbledore, who had just appeared in his frame.

With a smile that was equal parts bright and wistful, the late wizard disappeared again.

“What...?”

Severus turned to Minerva, who was the very picture of seething anger.

“He is not forgiven yet. Especially for what he did to you,” she said, with a quiet coldness completely opposed to her bearing.

“Minerva. ‘He’ is a portrait.”

She startled him by answering, fury now reaching her voice,

“He is not forgiven for that, either.”

It was a strange thing to witness for Severus, this tense fragility that was visible in her all of a sudden – somehow more shocking this time than it had been yesterday night, for it was now manifesting itself in her office, where she usually projected strength.

“I think we won’t get back to work for tonight,” he ventured quietly, and Minerva nodded. Rolling her shoulders, she said,

“Even though I know it to be false, I feel like I haven’t moved at all today. And I’m wide awake again.”

Severus smiled, as something occurred to him.

“Do you need a way to let off steam?”

The look Minerva gave him for that made his cheeks burn.

“I didn’t mean... Albus and I used to duel in the Old Hall sometimes.”

Minerva was immediately on board with that idea, so they relocated to the Old Hall, easily reached through a corridor behind an inconspicuous door halfway down the staircase from the office. It had been the main place of assembly before the Great Hall had been finished, and was closed to students nowadays. Sometimes, ceremonies would be held in it, but tonight, they put it to a much more mundane use.

They duelled fiercely, and it was a heady experience, to bask in the magic that filled the room more and more the longer they were at it. There only was this one moment at the beginning, when they got into position, where, from the look on her face, Minerva remembered just as well as he did the last and only time they’d raised their wands against each other.

It was soon forgotten in the joy of using ever-sillier spells, while trying to keep up the initial earnestness of the exercise. Minerva finally broke down giggling like a girl when she got past his defences and managed to spell his robes pink. With golden stars on them.

“Undo this immediately,” Severus snarled, but he couldn’t really hit the tone he wanted when she was laughing so wonderfully, and so soon after the seriousness of what had come before.

Minerva calmed down, and removed the spell, with a last quiet snicker.

“Shall we retire?” she said, not quite a question, and Severus nodded and followed. A hot bath, leisurely touches, slow movements, filthy murmurs, tender whispers, and mutual orgasms later, they finally found themselves in Minerva’s bed. The quarters behind the office had redecorated themselves after Severus’ tenure as headmaster. Unsurprisingly, the bedroom looked quite a bit lighter and brighter, even if, when it came down to it, not all that much had actually changed.

Severus cast a quick _Tempus_ before lying down to sleep, and Minerva sighed at the numbers appearing in front of them.

“Another short night.”

He turned to his side and looked over at her carefully, trying to assess whether her tone spelled regrets, but she angled her body towards his and leaned closer, until they were flush against each other, her hair tickling his naked chest.

“And I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

Sleep came easily, then, listening to her calm breaths, and feeling her warmth against him once more.

He woke up in the middle of the night. The bed was empty. Again.

Approaching the door that led to the office, after having donned a hastily-conjured dressing gown, he heard her talk quietly to... Albus. That voice was unmistakable, even if he couldn’t make out any of the words. _Well, you had me fooled with that act of animosity_ , he thought bitterly for a second, before he forced himself to trust her this time.

It didn’t really help that Minerva raised her voice a few seconds later. Severus found himself unable to draw back. It wasn’t because of his spy reflexes that he stayed and listened – no, he could put that down purely to his personal insecurities.

“How could I tell him, Albus? His trust would be forever broken – “

Severus leaned closer hastily when she didn’t continue, certain they must be discussing him, but couldn’t catch any part of Albus’ – apparently interrupting – reply.

“Oh, don’t give me false hope,” Minerva continued now, her voice coming through perfectly clear. “It may be an old wound, but a very painful one, as you well know.”

There was nothing for it – Severus was fairly sure he was about to hear something that Minerva should tell him herself, but he wouldn’t be able to stop listening, unless...

“Minerva?” he called out.

Silence. Then,

“In here.”

Severus counted to five and opened the door. Minerva, also attired in a simple black dressing gown, shot him a somewhat caught-out-look. She’d already turned away from the portraits, but said anyway,

“I had to talk to Albus.”

Not knowing what to reply, Severus settled for a blank stare that served to make her look guilty. Finally, he decided on,

“He’s forgiven, then, I take it.”

That made her wince, but she stated firmly,

“No. But there was no one else for this.”

“Which leaves me to assume that I am not a suitable choice for your secrets. Or that you were talking about me.”

Minerva sighed, and looked resigned, instead of berating him for his rather petty remark.

“Come,” she said, moving past him and back into the bedroom.

“They’ve heard enough for tonight.”

A careless wave of her hand back towards the room and its many portraits accompanied her words.

Severus closed the door and followed Minerva carefully. She appeared to be weighed down by the thing that was as of yet untold.

“You’d do well to remember that I have absolved you of your guilt,” Severus tried, but it only succeeded in drawing a distressed little cry from Minerva. More worried by the second, he closed the last few inches between them, took her hand, and made them both sit down on the edge of the bed. Minerva complied, in way too docile a manner.

After a long, uncomfortable silence, she began.

“In your fifth year, you had a falling-out with Lily Evans, whom you loved.”

The words hurt, not because they were true, but because he had thought himself free at last. Severus was long past feeling resentment over anything to do with Lily, but it _was_ painful to have the memory of her intrude on his fragile new happiness.

“She came to me, and asked for advice. I had the deepest misgivings about you, then, and nothing but worry for her because of the closeness I perceived between the two of you. I advised her to stay away from you. And she had much faith in my opinion, then.”

None of this was entirely unexpected. It didn’t astonish him that Lily had spoken with her Head of House, that said Head of House had warned her about him. In fact, he had deeply resented his then-teacher for what terrible things he had been sure she had said to Lily.

“Is that all?”

Minerva turned her head sharply to meet his eyes, instead of staring into space, and said,

“Hear me out.”

Severus looked away. He didn’t want to hear her out. It could only get worse. Minerva, however, took his silence as assent.

“Late in the summer of 1981, there was a crisis meeting with Albus where it was decided that the Potters would go into hiding under Fidelius. Lily cornered me afterwards. By then, it was common Order knowledge that Albus had just recently acquired a spy, and she asked if I knew whether it was you. Or, even if I didn’t, whether the school still had contact addresses for former students. She insisted repeatedly that she had to ‘make things right’ between you. ‘Just in case’, she said.”

Minerva fell silent.

After a few moments, Severus asked, despite himself, as he was dreading the answer,

“What did you tell her?”

His voice was emotionless, and so was Minerva’s when she replied.

“That I didn’t know and that I couldn’t give her an address.”

 “But?”

A harsh little laugh came from Minerva, the sound devoid of any happiness.

“I was almost certain it was you from the hints Albus had dropped – intentionally, I’m sure – and on top of that I knew his spy was scheduled to check in later that night. Had she asked Albus, she might have gotten the answer she needed. She might have stayed to talk to you. I... I am truly sorry, Severus, I...”

She stopped with a chocked noise.

“You had no reason to trust me, then,” Severus forced out, but the words rang hollow in his ears. Lily, his Lily, had wanted to talk to him, and he would never know...

Oh, this would not do. He was lying to himself.

 _Remember_ , Severus let the voice inside his head snarl at him, _remember how you were during that summer, remember the volatile state you were in, remember that you had not yet learned enough empathy to truly despise the Dark Lord for what he stood for and for what he did to others, instead of for what he was threatening to do to the woman you loved. Remember all of this, and then think how you might have reacted to seeing Lily. It is more than possible that you would have shown contempt for her husband, for her_ child _. She would have hated you, really hated you, after that._

“Severus?”

Minerva’s voice sounded far away and somewhat tinny, as if coming from an old gramophone.

“Yes?” he heard himself reply, his own voice not much clearer to his ears.

“You’re not... angry?”

“Not with you.”

He hid his face in his hands. It was getting difficult to keep up a stony expression, when he hated himself so much right now.

There was silence, again, except for the ringing in his ears, and then a tentative hand on his shoulder. A point of warmth. With a heart-wrenching sound he had no energy to be embarrassed about, Severus turned towards that warmth, and clung to it, clung to _her_.

He would not cry. He never cried for anyone, therefore he would certainly not allow himself to do so in self-pity. He couldn’t stop himself from shaking, however. Minerva had drawn her arms around him, had bedded his head on her chest. Now, her hands started moving over his shoulders and back, slowly, calmly.

She refrained from asking, and maybe that’s why he found himself telling her, his head half-hidden in the fabric of her dressing gown. She didn’t tell him that he was wrong in accusing himself, and he was grateful for that. She only said quietly,

“It might not have come to that. And don’t dismiss the possibility just because it is easier to hate yourself than... me.”

Just as quietly, Severus responded.

“I’m through with blaming others.”

Another thing he had learned at a much, much later point in time than the potential conversation with Lily would have been.

“And you never did anything by halves, so you’ve moved too far in the other direction now.”

Severus was too wrung-out to even protest that statement. He simply followed when Minerva moved up the bed and made the duvet cover them again. He didn’t want to relinquish his hold on her, and she didn’t make him.

They were woken by Deno, because Minerva had forgotten to spell her alarm.

It was Saturday, so it didn’t matter so very much that they’d overslept – they’d just have less time to prepare another of those tedious school Governors’ meetings that was scheduled for the afternoon. It was only half past nine now - Filius had sent the elf around because Minerva usually made it a point not to miss breakfast in the Great Hall when she was in the castle.

Minerva sent the elf back to reassure Filius, and to bring them breakfast after that, while Severus grumbled about Muggle alarm clocks being preferable to using a spell, as they would automatically be set again for the next day when you’d turned them off etc.

He downed a coffee from the breakfast tray as soon as Deno had deposited it on the bed, and sighed with content.

“I’ll get less grumpy now, I think.”

Minerva looked at him somewhat nonplussed, though he wasn’t sure why. She kept shooting him strange glances throughout the day, and it was making Severus very, very irritable. He managed though to only snap at her after they were alone again in Minerva’s quarters that evening.

“Care to tell me why you won’t stop looking at me like that?”

“I thought that, even if you weren’t angry, you would be disappointed,” Minerva said, and continued furtively, as if afraid of creating a self-fulfilling prophecy,

“I thought that you would draw away.”

Even as she stated the words as a hypothetical, she sounded resigned, waiting for it to happen. Severus decided yet again that he hated that guilty look on her.

 _I know I am a vindictive bastard, but the man I have become would never throw away something as wondrous as this_ , he thought, remembering moments of unconscionable happiness during the last two days. What he said was,

 “Nothing good is ever absolute. And even if it were, we would always find a way to make it not so.”

Minerva fixed him with a look that made him worry he sounded too much like Albus. So he hurried on, before he could talk himself out of it.

“Anyway, I have recently come much closer to such an absolute than I would have thought to hope for.”

As declarations of love went, it was a rather obscure one. Minerva, however, answered it perfectly after a few seconds of silence, her smile fond, her eyes serious.

“So, I take it you might consider being disappointed and flawed with me from now on?”

For once, there was nothing wry or malicious about Severus’ smirk.

“Certainly.”

_For the rest of our lives, if you’ll have me._


End file.
